Web Archiving to Excavate Hidden Collections

It is well known that web sites do not last forever and unless they are digitally captured and preserved, what was once online can disappear overnight. Open Access initiatives such as Internet Archive, are important, but no one entity can capture everything. The California Digital Library has for some years rolled out WAS – its Web Archiving Service – that aims to provide the technical means for academic libraries and research institutions to capture and curate web content systematically. This presentation uses lessons learned from utilizing WAS at University of California, Irvine, Libraries to capture hidden collections locally, regionally and internationally. The talk highlights the archiving issues and provides a checklist of emerging “best practices” in the collection development and archiving of online content. Given that the web traverses the globe issues of copyright and fair use are complicated. Should, for example, a U.S. library capture content posted online in Singapore, Hong Kong, Macau, or China? As Arab Spring and the Occupy Movement have demonstrated, the use of social media and web postings have proliferated and web archiving is one way to ensure that such content is preserved and made accessible to current and future researchers